Sony Vaio PCG-NV109M

Coming from a company that produces svelte notebook PCs, the cumbersome looking Vaio PCG-NV109M is a bit of a shock.

Its odd looks are a result of an integrated multi-purpose drive bay beneath the CD-RW/DVD-ROM combination drive. The bay is used to make modular upgrades to the notebook and allows components to be added or removed without rebooting.

Among the accessories supplied to use the port are a MiniDisc drive, a subwoofer for beefier sound and a floppy disk drive. A floppy drive is still useful and the subwoofer certainly helps shore up the sound quality, but the most interesting addition is the MiniDisc drive.

Unfortunately, you can't use the subwoofer to play music back from MiniDiscs as the units occupy the same space. This is slightly frustrating as music is the format's forte and one of the main selling points of the notebook.

Sony can be forgiven for this oversight though, as the MiniDisc tracks you put in can be copied over to the hard disk and played. With 30GB to play with, you shouldn't run short for a while.

It is good to see MiniDisc media included in a Vaio although it could have been done a little more thoughtfully.

Our biggest gripe is that the MiniDisc drive cannot be used away from the machine as a portable disc player. Also, the MiniDisc is strictly for music as standard computer data cannot be stored on the disks.

It is a useful digital music storage medium but a portable MiniDisc player is required to get the best out of the drive.

With the novelties out of the way, the other features on this notebook still warrant a mention. It has a 15in TFT display which is good for a notebook. The NV109M is designed for users who want to be multimedia savvy while on the move.

The ATI Mobility Radeon 7500 graphics card is a great option as it provides enough horsepower to play the vast majority of games on the market if you are looking for a little entertainment. DVD movies are an option thanks to the combination CD-RW/DVD-ROM drive on the right flank.

With the subwoofer connected, the sound is comfortably superior to most notebooks so movies, music and games sound as good as they look.

The notebook has good connections for peripherals with a bank of ports including ones for the modem, network, FireWire and a connector for hooking up a television.

The NV109M also has three USB ports at the back and the usual range of legacy ports, providing almost all the connectivity a notebook could wish for.

It lacks an infrared port which is only a concern because a computer costing over £2,000 should want for nothing at all. As it is a Sony, the Memory Stick slot should come as no surprise.

The Vaio performed well in our labs tests. The 1.6GHz Pentium 4-M processor is a mobile one designed to maximise battery life. Backed up by 256MB of DDR memory here, it returned a competitive performance score for a notebook.

Music and video fans will love the NV109M. Its unique features help it do the impossible; namely stand out from the increasingly indistinguishable crowd of notebook computers. If the thick dimensions and 3.9kg weight impress, take a look at this interesting portable computer.

Price: £2,003 (inc. VAT)

Contact: Sony 0990 424424
www.vaio.sony-europe.com

Also consider: Dell Inspiron 8200.
Formidable.